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Is your social media strategy about leveraging Twitter trends?

There are many social media strategies. Some are all-encompassing, and others are social network-specific.
If your social media strategy is focused on leveraging Twitter trends, as new or small brands would do, this blog is for you.

Social media case in point

The South African Broadcasting Corporation (or SABC) – South Africa’s 80-year old public broadcaster – announced on Wednesday 11th of May that music playlists at all its 18 radio stations will be made up of 90% local music effective Thursday the 12th of May.

“Together, the SABC radio stations have a massive total listenership of 24 million”

This unexpected announcement, which was (un)welcome depending on music genre preference, or any other side of the fence interested South Africans were on, created excitement and consternation all at the same time.

Let’s put this into context. The issue here is that SABC radio stations have for decades been playing mainly international music, with claims that as low as 20% of the playlists were from South African musicians at some stage.

Enter Twitter

As has become natural, Twitter became the battleground for views in favour of or against this bold move by the SABC to turn the tables literally overnight, with keywords #90PERCENTLocal and #LocalMusic trending on Thursday. At the same time, mainstream media went into overdrive, some hailing Mzwakhe Mbuli and especially Don Laka as heroes for fighting for a higher share of local music on SABC channels.

Lifespan of a Twitter trend

The discussion on traditional media about the SABC’s decision to go 90% local continued into the weekend and beyond, with Sunday newspapers giving prominence to this development, enriching the story with interviews including with the SABC COO – Hlaudi Motsoeneng.

However, Twitterers have moved on since Thursday, as new trending topics took root.

Source: Mention

As the Mention graph above shows, the keywords #LocalMusic + #90PercentLocal trended for only one day.

Key insight

Clearly, some Twitter trends do not last beyond a day. Our research shows that an average trend lasts for only 12 hrs.

Thus, if your brand’s social media brand strategy is to leverage trending topics, then you have to jump on the bandwagon as soon you become aware of such relevant trends. We did 🙂